A Ghost and a Shadow
by Artemis Fowl II
Summary: The boy who was naught but a shadow of himself, and a girl who was naught but the ghost of another...


Well I wanted to write something, because I don't think that Riku gets enough attention in kingdom hearts, and I love Namiku!

She drew. It was her hobby, her job, her life, her very existence.

He fought. It was his hobby, his job, his life, his very existence.

Neither of them liked their existences.

She was sick of drawing, for everything she drew had ramifications on the world that she could only guess at.

He hated fighting, had never really liked it, and was sick to his very core whenever he had to take a life, though the feeling had dulled to a persistent numbing now, and he found himself unable to feel either sickness or joy.

She continued to draw because it was required of her. At first she drew because they told her to. They told her that it was her purpose, her only reason for being. Now she drew to correct her mistakes, to try and atone for what she had done but also out of fear. Fear of DiZ, fear of Organisation XIII, but mostly of all; fear of what she would be if she stopped drawing.

He continued to fight because he had to. He started fighting to protect people, and then was slowly warped until he no longer knew who he should protect, and who he should fight. Now he fought to repay the one he had hurt most, and to try and right the huge wrong he had put in the worlds through is actions, but most of all; he fought because he would have no purpose if he stopped.

They sat at opposite ends of a long white table, her still drawing and him recovering from his latest battle.

Unbeknownst to her, he watched her every move. He watched the way her tongue stuck out to the right when she was concentration. He watched the way she only turned a picture half way when she needed to, and twisted her head the rest. He watched the way she would flick her hair out of her eyes and tuck it behind her ear in annoyance every time it got in her way. He noticed how she would look at some of the pictures for a second before throwing them on the pile behind her, and sometimes she would linger for a while just looking at a single picture with a slight smile on her face, and a tear in her eye.

Unbeknownst to him, she watched his every move from behind her facade. She watched the way he would sit with one leg slung casually over the other, or both resting on the table (until DiZ came in when he would sit to attention in anticipation of an assignment). She watched how he would drift off whilst looking at her, without realising it (and during these times she would turn bright red and draw frantically until he "surfaced"). She watched how his emotions would flitter across his face when he looked at her, like birds chasing each other across the sky. She watched how he would wince occasionally when he moved, as he stretched or brushed a half healed injury.

They were both proud, they continued their jobs with a passion and dove into their work like no human (or nobody) had ever done so before. They were also both pathetic, hiding from their problems by creating ways of "fixing" everything through a method that was attainable to them, even though they both knew their problems needed solutions they themselves couldn't bring.

He stood occasionally, stretching or leaving to prepare for his mission. She never rose except to wordlessly procure drawing supplies. They could both sustain themselves without food or drink indefinitely, her by the fact she was not alive and therefore didn't need to infringe upon the requirements of the living, and him because he had traded nearly all of his humanity for the power of the dark, which he kept caged deep within him but was nevertheless still present. Thanks to their unending twilight they both spent all of their time in the white room, or in his case on a mission, sitting opposite each other in silence.

It was a day similar to every other when their lives changed. They sat in the same manner, her neatly perched on the edge of her chair with her head bent over the paper scribbling away, her hair forming a curtain from behind which she could watch him, and him sitting back in his chair with his feet up and his arms crossed, the picture of severe relaxation.

Riku stood up and stretched his arms, lifting them far above his head and twisting them to pull ever muscle across his back and chest. He saw Naminé blush and start a new drawing with a renewed ferocity, and grinned to himself. Next he lightly swung his arms and then bent over in one, grabbing the tip of his toes first time and stretching his back. He couldn't see Naminé from this position but he could guess where she was looking. Next he rose and bent over his own back, touching the back of his calves in one motion, before righting himself and rotating his shoulders.

His stretching done he left the room without a word, as was their custom.

He went to DiZ, or as he was formerly known; Ansem the Wise. Nobody called him that anymore, but Riku had only known him for a short time and could clearly see how he had gained that name, He was currently working hard on merging the Nobody that was Roxas with the shell that was Sora.

"What are you doing, wandering around like that?" DiZ asked, glancing at the blindfold Riku still wore.

"It helps me contain Xehanort's heartless, and it stops me giving into the power he could offer me." Riku said without inflection, having argued his case a million and one times.

"It is just a strip of cloth, how can it protect you from so much? No, it is your own mind that is holding that abomination at bay and the sooner you realise this; the sooner you can take than damned thing off!"

"It may be my mind that is holding him in place, but this helps me to keep it locked away, and whilst I could keep him safely away without it I fear what would happen if I lost concentration, or if I were to become tempted again."

DiZ's only reply was a snort before he returned to his computer and carefully monitored the progress of the assimilation.

"You know this, and have argued your case before. Why bring it up now?" Riku asked, not accepting DiZ usual ploy of ignoring him. DiZ attempted it, seeming completely focussed in his work and so Riku stood and waited. He didn't have to wait for long because both of them knew which could wait the longest.

"I argue my point because it is a sign of how you reject your humanity. You push yourself further away from everyone and alienate yourself more and more each passing day. My time is up, I lost my life when my apprentice turned on me, but I am damn well going to make sure I do everything in my power to undo what my research unwittingly lead to. I wasn't to restore the world as much as I can, and every life I save I will consider one less point against my soul. I will never reach a point of equilibrium, for my evil deeds far outweigh my good, but you owe it to me to make sure you return to what you were!" DiZ Yelled, a passion igniting in his eyes.

"I can never return to normal!" Riku shouted back, his mood spoiled in an instant. "I welcomed the darkness into my heart, in return I got what I wanted and I can help Sora now! I don't care what you think you can achieve by "saving" me!" The quotations and sarcasm clanged into place with an iron-clad finality, "But my life is not my own anymore, it is entirely devoted to saving him! In case you forget my time is up as well, and we both know that one day I will lose my grip on this monster inside of me, and I will be consumed by darkness."

"Exactly!" Ansem yelled back; "The less human you are the less power your heart has of holding him back! If you push away all of your humanity you will never be able to stand against him because humanity is the one thing that he cannot fight against! He became a heartless for the power, and in doing so cast aside everything that made him a human! He has no concept of humanity anymore, cannot even remember what it felt like, and so it is the best way of keeping him out because he cannot hope to even begin to formulate a counter attack against something he doesn't understand in the slightest!"

"But if I become more human he will play off of my emotion, he will gain strength by crushing me! He will show me pictures, horrible, _horrible_ pictures of everything I have done, every life that was taken by me directly or not, and he will torment me day and night. One day he will finally break me, and he will try to gain position over my body and I promise you now that I will gladly destroy myself at that moment rather than be enslaved and used as an instrument for his return to power!" The boy exclaimed, venom shooting into his words. For the first time DiZ was afraid. He had never seen Riku's determination like this before. He knew the boy had a lot to fight for, out of both regret and loyalty, but he had never seen the depths to which this purpose ran, and the ice cold hatred the boy felt for the parasite inside of him.

A gasp came from the door. Both men turned quickly to see the source of the noise, months of fighting taking their toll on their nerves, only to see a whisper of white cloth as it whipped around the corner. Riku took a step towards the door before looking back at DiZ, partly for an explanation and partly for authorisation. After so long in the realm of darkness his emotions were tangled and stunted, not aided of course by his continual plight to purge himself of his pain, and so he had only a vague idea of what was going on.

Ansem was watching him intently now, it unnerved Riku but the boy felt a strong tie of loyalty to Naminé now, and he was unwilling to let his discomfort get the better of him. After a moment however DiZ said: "Go." And he motioned for Riku to follow, before turning back to his desk as if nothing had happened. Riku immediately ran from the room, using the powers he gained at his unimaginable cost to follow her scent. He had always liked it, a mixture of wax from her crayons, the cheep washing powder DiZ used on their clothes and what smelled like lilacs, even though she had never even seen any that weren't one of Sora's memories before.

As he left DiZ watched the screen blankly for a moment.

"No good will come of it in the end" he muttered to himself, "she will be reintegrated with Kairi, and he will be left alone. Still, he feels for her, and she might be able to get him out of his shell... I only fear that when she must leave it will hurt him more than he could possibly imagine. I feel like a father, watching his son with his first crush, and his daughter too... I can't help but worry for the pair of them even though it is futile-" He stopped to wipe a hand across his cheek, removing a single tear that had escaped. "Well, there is naught to do... As I said my time is up, and all that is left is to let them figure it out for themselves."

He sighed, and ran his sleeve over his eyes once more, before turning back to the screen and diligently watching the transfer, all the while wishing that there was an easier way to fix everything.

Riku found her in a small room deep within the passageways of the mansion they were staying in. She was sitting on the floor, hugging her knees and crying gently to herself.

"Are you okay?" Riku asked, feeling like an idiot afterwards for asking such an obvious question.

Naminé jumped up with a squeak, hiding in a corner with her arms up, as if to ward off a foe.

"How did you find me here? I though nobody else knew about this place!" She exclaimed, not calming down in the slightest having seen who her follower was.

"I just followed you here, I wanted to make sure you were okay... why did you run away?" He asked her.

They stood in silence for a moment, him in black with his silver hair billowing down his back and his eyes masked by a blindfold, her in white with her blonde hair covering half her face and her visible eye wide in fright.

Finally Naminé broke the silence.

"I don't want you to die." She said in a tiny voice, only just loud enough to hear (though Riku was sure she wouldn't have minded him not hearing it).

"I'm not going to-" He started, but was cut off when she ran at him and clutched him waist.

"I heard you and Ansem fighting! I didn't want to but I ran out of black and I needed it to draw you and I was in the hallway when you shouted at him and I didn't want to listen honestly but I couldn't help it and you said that if Xehanort took over you would kill yourself and I don't ever want that to happen!" She blurted out, her voice muffled by his coat and her tears.

Riku stood there in shock for a moment before putting his arms around her hesitantly. He patted her gently on the back until she calmed down, though she didn't let go and expose her bright red face to him.

"Look, Naminé..." He said gently, "I'm not going to lose control okay? I have a lot of promises to keep and I don't intend to let that git get the better of me and stop me fulfilling them! Haven't you heard, I'm far to dense to go back on a promise!"

She chuckled.

"You're not dense! I think you're perfect-" But she realised what she was saying and let out another squeak, clutching at him even harder, as if trying to bury her embarrassment in his coat.

He chuckled, and held her a little tighter.

"What?" She said, annoyed at being the butt of a joke.

"No don't worry... I just love that noise!" He said, and felt her press herself into his chest a little tighter.

"Riku, can I ask you something?" She said.

"Anything."

"What do you see when you look at me?"

Riku paused, off-put by the odd question. Nevertheless his hectic emotions allowed him to answer coherently.

"Well I see a lot of things... I see Kairi in you, but you aren't her. I see innocence, but not naivety. I see someone who has had more than their share of trouble but hasn't let it sour them. I see someone fragile, but strong... someone who can easily fight for them self, but compels people to fight for her. I see someone young, yet older than anyone should possibly be. Mostly I see someone beautiful and powerful... someone captivating."

She said nothing... they stood like that for a long time, her wrapped in his arms, neither talking or moving and yet both at peace. Then:

"Do you want to know what I see when I look at you?" She asked.

"Of course."

"I see determination mostly. I see someone who decides what they want, and sets out to get in no matter what. I see loyalty, someone who will stand for their friends even if it costs them everything they are. I see someone who protects people, and places everyone else above himself even though he is worth more than any other people put together. I see someone who forgets himself in his search for his goal, even though he needs to look inwards and realise that he has to make time for his own happiness as well."

Riku froze. Her words hit something deep inside him, striking an uncomfortable chord in his soul. He gently disentangled her arms from him and stepped back.

"I cannot find my own happiness when I have destroyed others, not until I fix what I have done." He said.

She paused for a moment, as if either thinking or preparing herself.

"Then will you allow me my happiness?" She asked. He nodded and she took a single step forward and stood on tiptoe. They were so close her smell overpowered him, he could fell her body pressing against him and see into her perfect blue eyes. She closed them and he felt a moment of disappointment before he realised why, and before he could react her lips were pressed lightly against his.

He froze for a moment,, uncertain of what to do until his rust emotions returned to him, and he wrapped his arms around her, gently kissing her back.

They stayed like that for a while, and then moved back to the white room. They sat next to each other, black and white still defined and yet so close that they shared everything. They thrived in each other's company, the two half-people... one a shadow of a person and one a ghost of a person. The perfect match.

"Riku?" She asked him one day, he head resting in his lap as he lovingly stroked her hair.

"Hmm?" He hummed at her quizzically, not wanting to disturb her rest.

"How do you keep Xehanort under control?" She asked. She immediately felt him tense, and feared she had gone too far until she felt him relax again.

"I make sure he has nothing to grip, nothing to use against me."

"But doesn't that mean you have to cut off your heart?"

"Yes, but it is for the best."

"Then what about the time you have spent with me... has your heart been cut off?"

He paused. In the glow of love he hadn't thought about that... he checked his mental barriers and surely enough his heart was laid bare, his emotion allowed to run free... yet Xehanort couldn't use them against him... there was some force blocking him from grabbing any of Riku's emotions to twist against him. Riku searched for a long time, wondering what it was that kept the creature at bay. Eventually he realised it was Naminé. She had bonded with him at such a deep level that Xehanort couldn't comprehend what had happened. Her very presence had changed Riku so much that Xehanort's trick no longer worked, he no longer had any power over Riku at all.

He told this to Naminé, and she celebrated with him, glad that the ghost who could live forever had saved her shadow from dying.

When the time came for Riku to take Roxas from his job, to bring him to DiZ for the final stage he realised he was out powered. Roxas may have only been a ghost of Sora but he was powerful indeed... That is why Riku realised he had to stop fighting the dark, and use his control gained from Naminé presence to give him the advantage he so sorely needed.

It worked, and he quickly captures Roxas. Before he took him to DiZ he allowed the rain to wash over him for a second, and allowed it to wash his tears away. He knew that with Sora bought back that it would only be a matter of time until Naminé was reunited with her Heart, and Kairi was reborn... and he could help but feel selfish for the first time in his life.

He couldn't help but wish that there was another way, or hat he was the type of person who could ignore his friend, ignore the worlds and let them all go to hell so that he could stay with his love. But he wasn't that person, he wouldn't do that. With a final look around the desolate cityscape that was the home of Castle Oblivion he opened a dark portal and stepped through, leaving his sorrow behind so as not to hurt his Naminé.


End file.
